Roman à clef
by Moonlit-Jeannie
Summary: A very late April flashfic for moirariordan and a note for anyone who wants to participate in the June round of flashfic.


**AN: This is probably the hardest time that I've had with a flashfic and I'm still not sure how I feel about it. I loved it when I first got the prompt and started writing it, but recently I've had so much trouble with it between my computer not cooperating and writer's block. And it's so late! I apologize about that and I promise that my next one won't be so late. I have it all pretty much mapped out in my mind and have about one-thousand words of it written already. It also helps that I don't plan on it being as long as this one or the last one that I wrote.**

**I know that this will seem pretty rushed, especially toward the end, and will quite possibly be one of the worst things that I've posted (that's still up), but please be nice and take it all in stride. Especially since before the AN and disclaimer was added it was over 9500 words. Haha. I'm really sorry about this, Meagan, and I hope you like it all the same! **

**Here is the prompt, and at the bottom will be a note for all of those who participate (or want to participate) in the flashfic rounds.**

**Basically, Meagan wanted a story in which Casey publishes a telling novel. Did the family know? How did they react? Did she even know what she wrote? I've messed that prompt up so much, it isn't even the same thing, haha. And again…I'm sorry about that. You'll see how I changed it when you read this.**

**p.s. I saw a couple of typos while I was scanning through this, waiting for FFN to participate so I could upload it. I didn't want to jinx my computer, though, so just try to ignore them. :)**

**Disclaimer: I do not own **_**Life with Derek **_**or anything that might be referenced in this story.**

…_**Roman à clef…**_

"Why exactly did you drag me to this movie again?" Derek asked in a bored tone as he watched the parade of previews play. "Oh look, it's _The Princess Diaries 30_, how exciting."

Emily smacked Derek in the arm, "Shut up. I like the previews. Besides, I brought you here because I read the book and I thought you would like it. That and I couldn't get anyone else to come with me."

Derek rolled his eyes, "Gee, thanks Em. It's always nice to know that I'm loved. What kind of name is it, anyway? _Antagonistic Muscle_? That's the dumbest title I've ever heard. Worse than _The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants _and that was pretty bad. It was about a pair of pants. I think that's all that really has to be said there."

"Titles can be misleading," was all Emily could say. Derek shook his head and Emily sighed. "Look, I've seen the movie before, okay? I can promise you that you'll like it. It's one of those movies that people just relate too, I suppose." Emily laughed and Derek looked at her curiously, "Just watch it, okay? I paid for your ticket and I actually bought you snacks, Derek. Do you know how much money I had to shell out for that? Just sit and enjoy a free movie that cost someone else over thirty dollars."

"Oh, yeah, sure, try to guilt trip me. When will you learn that that does not work on me? And seriously, you saw it before? Why are we even here if you saw it before?"

"I went to the premiere, I know the author. So that obviously doesn't count. I want to see it in its natural environment. Lackadaisical teenagers who go in groups with their friends or come for the sole purpose of making out, that and who was the only person who went with you to see _Infestation_ when you wanted to see it for the fifth time? That's right, it wasn't Edwin, your brother, and it wasn't Sam or Ralph, your best friends, it was your good friend Emily, and I fully intend to collect repayment. Of course, I did end up dishing out most of the cash then too, if I remember correctly. Okay, you're paying for a movie that I want to see sometime. Snacks too. That means Reese's Pieces, red vines, popcorn, and chili cheese fries. And no freebie movie."

He grabbed a handful of popcorn that was mixed with Milk Duds, stuffing them into his mouth before answering. "We'll see. You play dirty, Miss Davis."

"Oh, I know," she answered happily. "Just ask Sheldon." Derek began to choke on his popcorn and candy mixture and Emily patted him on the back. "You okay?" she asked once his coughing fit had ended.

He shook his head. "I just can't believe you said that. Sweet, innocent, little Emily Davis," he wiped a fake tear from his eye. "I've never been so proud of you." Derek paused for a moment before continuing, "Or really repulsed either. That was way too much information, Em."

"As if you and Ralph don't do the same thing all the time, you just don't want to hear about it because it involves another guy and you only want to think about girls in that way." She reached over and sneaked a handful of popcorn out of the bag before Derek could stop her. "Now shush, the movie's about to start."

"This is going to be stupid," Derek drawled and sank down in his seat, almost embarrassed to be seen in the theater at what he considered to be a chick flick when he clearly wouldn't be getting any action and would be forced to sit through the entire movie. When he shared these feeling with Emily, she laughed and told him that he wished he could get some action from her.

He shook his head and looked around the theater, seeing the usual suspects. A group of giggling girls in the back who were probably there solely for the fact that Zac Efron would be playing the lead male character, a guy who looked like he had been dragged along by his younger sister, and a few couples who had already began to cuddle with each other during the previews. He felt like puking. At least he could sympathize with the guy who was there with his sister.

"Who is actually in this movie besides Zac Efron?" Derek asked, almost afraid of the answer he would receive. If it was Amanda Bynes, Brittany Snow, or Kate Hudson he was out of there.

No matter how hot he thought they all were, they just oozed of predictable chick flick.

Emily shrugged, "As if I'm going to tell you that," she hissed. "Now just watch the movie and don't make me hit you again because I will, don't even try to test me."

_A brunette leans her head against the car window, watching the scenery pass her by as the car speeds pass. The sun beats down on her and her dark brown hair shimmers, appearing to be almost red when the light hits it from a certain angle. The focus on the girl fades and shifts toward a middle-aged woman in the front seat whose hands are firmly gripping the steering wheel._

"_Cady? Are you going to ignore me for the entire trip?"_

_The girl, Cady, finally looks away from the window and looks at the slightly younger girl who is sitting next to her clutching a soccer ball. "Will you please tell our mother that the entire trip isn't even two and a half hours and that if she wanted me to talk to her, then she shouldn't have married a relative stranger and uprooted us from our home and _

_educational and social environments?" she asks emotionlessly._

_The younger girl sets her ball aside and leans forward slightly before opening her mouth to speak. "Mom?" she starts._

_The woman looks into her rearview mirror at her two daughters in the backseat. "I heard your sister, Lucy," she informs her younger daughter. "Tell her that Gene is a very nice man and that she liked him when she met him at the wedding."_

_Cady's head snaps up and her eyes narrow. "That was before I knew that he had kids of his own and also before I knew that we would have to move. How do you wait to tell someone those kinds of things until after the wedding? It was sort of like, oh, now that we're at the reception; let's spring the oh-so-wonderful news on everyone. Well, guess what, Mom! That isn't the kind of news that you just spring on someone."_

_The woman sighs. "I know, and Gene and I probably should have done things differently for both you and Lucy and for his children as well, but it all happened so fast and we knew it would upset you, Cady."_

Derek looked over at Emily suspiciously. "This is going to turn out to be some sort of Lifetime-like movie, isn't it? If this starts getting sappy, I'm leaving."

Emily shook her head and heaved a sigh. "Would you just shut up already Derek? Some people might actually want to watch the movie and you are not leaving. So sit, eat your popcorn, and watch the movie before I have to actual resort to physical punishment like I mentioned before."

Derek rolled his eyes and slumped back in his seat, "Fine. I just don't see why you keep insisting that I can't leave, though. I mean, I can sit in the lobby or sneak into the theater next door and see _Fanboys_ because I'm pretty sure it said that that was showing here."

She raised an eyebrow. "_Fanboys_, Derek? Really? Not that I don't like the choice, but do you even know what it's about?" She watched as the car on the screen rolled down the street before pulling into a driveway. A man, who was probably in his early-forties, walked out followed by two boys and a little girl causing Emily to grin. "This is why I want you to watch the movie."

"Oh look, it's Zac-I-look-like-a-girl-Efron!" Derek exclaimed soon after the fangirls from the back row screamed. He was sure that they were probably fanning each other in attempts to remain conscious.

_Cady and Lucy remorsefully climb out of the car and cross the lawn to stand beside their mother. The aforementioned little girl hides behind the older boy's legs and peeks out at the group._

"_It's good to see you again, girls," the man, Gene, greets. "Eric, can you and Evan get the girls bags?" He turns to Cady and smiles, "We already have most of your things set up in the room that you girls will be sharing, the moving van brought most everything over yesterday."_

_The younger boy nods and walks over to the car before pulling two bags out of the trunk and dragging them along the ground behind him. His older brother, however, stares his father down as if in a challenge._

"_Eric," Gene warns. _

"_Dad?" Eric asks in a playful tone._

"Wait…" Derek said slowly. "This is…what is this? Is this?"

Emily once again merely raised an eyebrow and grinned. "I told you you'd like the movie. Now watch."

"No," Derek disagreed. "That's not how it works." His voice began to get louder, but he fortunately still kept it to a somewhat acceptable level. He wasn't shouting or anything, and he didn't think that the people who were making out or fawning over Zac Efron would exactly notice. He was also sure that the guy who was there with his little sister wouldn't care much for a disruption anyway. "You do not bring a guy to a movie that seems like it could quite possibly be based on an event in his life and whose characters' names are pretty damn close to the names of the people in his family and tell him to simply watch the movie. You're going to tell me what's up with this."

"Watch now, talk later," she instructed. "Look, I'll answer your questions later, just watch this and tell me what you think because I definitely have a feeling that you are going to like it."

"Oh yeah," he rolled his eyes. "I'm sure that I will. How…who even…this is just…"

"Watch," she demanded.

He leaned back and crossed his arms. "Sure, watch, as if it's that easy. This is just the story of my life or most of it anyway…and Zac Efron's playing me, that isn't exactly something that you can just tell someone to watch. It's train wreck material." Despite his protests, Derek stopped talking at Emily's demands (she really could be just as scary, if not scarier than Casey when she wanted to be), and watched the movie silently.

Or at least he tried to watch the movie in silence. When the dreadlocked kid that he recognized from American Idol from a couple of years earlier and Corbin Bleu showed up as Sam and Ralph, he couldn't hold it in anymore. "Emily…"

"Derek…" she counteracted. "Just watch."

"But Zefron's playing me," he whined. "And you're being played by Amanda Bynes…and Sam has dreadlocks and Ralph has a sad little fro."

She patted him on the head, "It's okay, just don't talk. You'll miss the good parts if you talk."

He made a face. "In this piece of chick flick crap, I highly doubt there are any good parts, Em. It's a freakin' Zac Efron movie with Corbin Bleu and Amanda Bynes in it. I'm surprised people aren't bursting into song and dancing."

_The door opens and Eric walks into Cady's room and collapses onto her bed. "So you're mad that my girlfriend," Cady interrupts him to correct his mistake, "okay, ex-girlfriend is going to the dance with the guy that you're apparently talking to or whatever and vice-versa. So…don't you think that Sean and Emma have the right idea?"_

"_The…right idea?" Cady asks, confused. "What, that they should go together to make Simon and the girl that Sean has a crush on jealous?"_

_Eric crosses his arms across his chest and raises an eyebrow, nodding. "Exactly. You don't want Matt going to the dance with Keira anymore than I do. So why not put a stop to the whole thing?"_

_Cady's tongue flicks out of her mouth and runs nervously along her bottom lip. "So you think we should go to the dance together?" she asks, confused by what Eric is proposing._

_Eric laughs and raises an eyebrow. "The two of us go to the dance together? How would that help things? No, I was thinking that you and Sean could go together and I could go to the dance with Emma."_

_Her mouth drops open and her eyes widen. "I can't do that. I mean…Sean and I are friends now, but we just broke up a couple of months ago. Do you know how awkward that would be?"_

_Eric shrugs. "Oh well. I guess it sucks to be you then, now doesn't it?"_

"_I have another idea, though," Cady interjects before Eric can try to shut her down. _

"_What if we tell Sean and Emma our plan and they still go together, but I go with Simon and you go with Junie?"_

_He looks at her questioningly, "Okay, let me just ask you something. Were you born with half a brain or did the doctors take it later? We want to make Keira and Matt halfway jealous, right? Simon and Junie aren't going to do that, besides, Junie isn't my type."_

"_Oh…" Cady trails off before speaking up again. "Wait, you have a type?"_

"_Don't sound so smug, of course I have a type. Everyone has a type. My type just happens to be made up of a very, very large variety of different girls. It's like cereal. You may like Fruit Loops, Frosted Flakes, Rice Krispies, Cheerios, and even Raisin Bran or oatmeal, but break out the Kashi, or whatever the hell that stuff is called, and any guy in their right mind would run away. I guess Sean just has different tastes."_

"_What about people who like to mix their cereals together? You know…Rice Krispies and Lucky Charms or Fruity Pebbles and Cocoa Puffs, or just a whole bunch all at the same time? You know, on Gilmore Girls, Rory and Paris always went to the cereal bar thing at Yale and stocked up on all kinds of cereal."_

"_Uh, I think that's enough of that autonomy. But yeah, it still works." He shrugs and stretches out across her bed, "So, Sean and Emma or not?"_

_Cady stares at him for a moment, her eyes unblinking. "I guess we could try it your way. And for future reference, I think you mean analogy. You might want to invest in a dictionary or thesaurus."_

"Hey, that whole cereal thing isn't bad. I'll have to remember that. Well done, Zef…for once. Is it almost over, can we leave now?"

Emily rolled her eyes, "Derek, just watch the damn movie and keep your comments to yourself before I find that I can't keep my hands to myself and smack you, okay?"

He smirked and she glared. "Say it and die, Venturi, you know what I meant."

_A car pulls into Emma's driveway and Sean, Emma, Eric, and Cady get out of the car and say their goodbyes. When they are finished saying their goodbyes, Cady looks up at Eric and grabs his hand before pulling him along behind her across the yards and to the side of the house before kissing him._

Derek looked back and forth between Emily and the screen where the two main characters were still heavily making out. Emily noticed this and smiled to herself before finally acknowledging his predicament. "If you want to say something, you can talk now."

He took a deep breath. "What the hell is that? What…what happened? Did we miss the whole freakin' dance? Why am I kissing Casey? This never happened…believe me, I would know if this ever happened. Why did Sam go into your house? Where's Schlep? Where's that random girl that Sam liked? Where are Kendra and Max?"

"Well," Emily drawled. "Apparently Sheldon and I aren't together anymore. And he and Junie are together. And Sam and I are together…and Ralph and Kendra got together…and Max, well, I don't really know what happened to him. I think he went to the bathroom and never came back because he isn't in the rest of the movie."

"Hey, shut up!" the boy from a few rows back who was there with his sister yelled when Emily added a laugh to the end of her statement.

"Why don't you shut up, you asshole? Is this entire movie about you and are you played by Zac Efron? No, I didn't think so. So you can just shut the hell up before I have to come back there and kick your ass!"

Luckily, the guy sat back and kept his mouth shut before whispering something to his sister, while Emily turned and stared at Derek, astonished.

"You wouldn't have really beat him up would you?"

"Why wouldn't I? Do you think I couldn't?"

Emily shrugged. "No…not really, you just don't really fight, you know?" She turned around and peeked at the guy who had had the outburst. "I think you could've taken him easily, actually. He looks pretty weak."

Derek grinned. "Exactly. I just wanted to scare him, I didn't want to have to get kicked out and maybe arrested for hurting someone."

"Good, now you really do need to shut up now, Derek. You don't want to miss anything else."

He looked at her incredulously before turning to once again face the screen. "Anything else?" he hissed. "What, do you mean there's actually more of this?"

After thirty minutes and a couple of trips to the bathroom, the movie was finally over. When Derek and Emily walked out of the theatre, he turned around to lay into her, but stopped when he heard the fangirls from the back row heading out of the auditorium.

"Oh my God, it was better than _Clueless_!"

"Uh, duh, I know. I told you that it was. I've seen it before, you know. But it totally is better than _Clueless _because they actually _do_ things in this movie."

"And because Zac's in it, of course," another of the girls inserted.

"Of course, and Corbin and Jason Castro were in it too and it was just so great. And it wasn't all dark and emo like _Cruel Intentions_."

"And not a total let down like _The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants_. I mean, come on! Was I the only one who saw the way he looked at her after she hit him with the tennis ball? Why couldn't he have been in the sequel? Kyle Schmid is totally hot."

"But not hotter than Zac Efron, right?"

Their voices trailed off as they walked toward the bathroom and Emily started to laugh. "Okay, seriously? When did _Cruel Intentions_ become 'dark and emo'? Seriously, it's a thriller, isn't it? Aren't all thrillers dark and stuff? Because _Wicker Park_ was all dark and twisty and confusing, but it wasn't emo."

"I, uh, wouldn't know because I've never seen _Wicker Park_ or probably half of the movies that they named off. So can we please move on to more important discussions like why the hell that movie was about my life and who the hell made it?"

"Let's save that question for later," Emily suggested. "Next?" Derek glared at her and she sighed. "It was worth a try, wasn't it?"

He stretched his arm over his head and looked around as they entered the lobby, taking notice of the movie poster for the first time that had Zac Efron and the girl who played his stepsister plastered on it with the title in large letters. "Wait…" he thought about something that Emily had said earlier. "You said that you knew the author and you went to the premiere. You didn't say that you knew the director or anything like that…there's a book about this too? Someone wrote this same stuff and _then _they made it into a movie? Who wrote it, Em? Schlep?"

Emily shook her head. "No, Sheldon didn't write it. He hasn't even seen the movie yet…I don't think. At least, he didn't go to the premiere with me. I've been sworn to secrecy, though, so I can't tell you who wrote it."

"What about a hint? Hints are good. I'll owe you."

She rolled her eyes. "Like how you owed me this time and I still ended up paying?"

"Yeah, but you really wanted me specifically to go to this movie, so that's different. And if you wanted me specifically to see and know about this movie, then couldn't you at least tell me who wrote the book?"

She smiled and Derek thought that he had gotten her to crack when she finally opened her mouth to say something, but she hurriedly shut it and pulled her cell phone out of her purse. "I have to call Sheldon, I promised to call him after we were finished. I'm sorry Derek, I promised the person not to say anything. I can tell you that it has the same title, though. If that helps any…"

It didn't help, but an hour later, Derek found himself in a setting where he could most definitely find answers. He hoped.

"Why are we in a bookstore? I thought you said we were going to play mini-putt."

Derek rolled his eyes and maneuvered his way to the nearest kiosk. "Well, I lied." He finally found one of the kiosks and hit a key to bring up the screen. "Okay, find it for me."

Ralph blinked. "Wait…so we're not going to go to the mini-putt course? What about the ice cream? Did you lie about that too?"

"Look, Ralph, buddy, if you find the book for me and get it, I will buy you an ice cream and we can go play two rounds of mini-putt, okay?" Derek wagered. He really needed to get his hands on that book. He also needed to figure out who the heck was out there writing those kinds of things about him. Emily had said that it wasn't Sheldon, but who else could it be? He didn't think it was Casey because although she liked writing, wasn't poetry more her kind of thing?

He eyed Derek suspiciously. "Are you sure that you're not just lying again to get me to find that book for you? I don't see why you couldn't just ask Emily to get you a copy." He shook his head. "Well, I guess if you aren't lying…"

Derek threw his arm around his neck and looked over Ralph's shoulder as he typed some things into the kiosk. "Great. Just, uh, if you have to preorder it or whatever, use your name and not mine. Okay?"

Ralph nodded. "Yeah, yeah." He really didn't know why Derek couldn't just buy the book for himself. Derek had claimed that there would be some level of embarrassment for him if he bought a chick-lit book. Not that the book was defined as being chick-lit, Ralph knew. "Okay, it's in the Young Adult section. You're not going to make me go get it by myself are you?" If he did, he was sure it might actually work out for him, so he didn't really care. The people who worked in bookstores were generally girls, right? Single girls…they liked guys who were in touch with their sensitive sides, right? If Derek could hear his thoughts, he would definitely laugh at his friend and say that he was in serious denial.

"Dunno, depends."

They headed over to the Young Adult section and search through the countless Meg Cabot, Sarah Dessen, Ann Brashares, and _Gossip Girl _books. Finally, Ralph found several copies on a shelf, at the end of the row, that was made of cardboard and had a picture of the Zac Efron and Alexandra Chando, the girl that Ralph knew played Casey's character, and a line about how there was now a hit movie based on the book and that there was a chance to win a date with Zac Efron, or something of that nature. He looked at the more than half-empty shelf and shook his head. No wonder there were so few left if there were prizes like that. He grabbed one of the books for Derek and walked back over to the other guy, who was on his hands and knees digging through a stack of copies of _Avalon High_.

"Yo, dude. I found it." Derek stood up quickly and looked down at the pile of books on the floor.

"Um…" He looked at the book in Ralph's hand and once again down at the mess that he had made. "Okay, thanks, let's go." He started to walk away and Ralph took notice of the pile.

"Shouldn't we, like, pick these up or something?"

Derek shrugged. "Probably, but isn't that why people work here? To clean up and pick up the messes…and, you know, all of that work crap."

Ralph thought about it for a moment and agreed that Derek had a point. "I guess. Okay, let's go. We're going to play mini-putt next, right?"

It took two rounds of mini-putt and a stop to buy ice cream, but a few hours later, Derek finally found himself back at his apartment. "Okay, let's see what exactly it is that's in this book," Derek muttered to himself as he flopped back onto his bed and broke the binding, folding the cover back. He hadn't recognized the author's name, but figured that didn't mean much because people didn't always use their real name, after all, wasn't Dr. Seuss' real name like Theodore something or something like that?

"Chapter one," he read aloud, rolling his eyes, "Requiem of a Life That Was." He paused for a moment and stared at the page and the quote that was written beneath it. "What? What's a requiem? What does that even mean?"

He stared at the phone that lay beside his bed. It beckoned him to use it. To pick it up and put it to the use that it was intended for, not to just sit there plugged into the wall doing nothing. Could he really read a-he flipped through the book to the last page as his mind wandered-nearly four hundred page book that had inspired something that was nothing short of bad nineties chick flick with casting from hell?

He could, he told himself. He could read it, no sweat. He'd read things before not under punishment of death. He could read something that he was in, if for that reason alone. That would be the easy part. All he had to do was figure out who the author was, and that was definitely the hard part.

"Cady's life before the beginning of this story was like that of many little girls' dreams before they begin to learn the reality of life." He suppressed the urge to yet again rolled his eyes, but was not able to stop the comment as it flowed from his lips, "Oh God, not this shit again. Well, Casey obviously knows who wrote it. I guess I could always attempt to drag the information out of her if this fails." He slapped himself with the book in attempt to get back on track. "Read," he commanded himself. "She took ballet classes, just like every little girl wants to do at some point in her life, she had a great relationship with both her mother and her sister, and she was admired both by her teachers and her peers for…For being the biggest loser on this planet, that's what," Derek interrupted himself.

"Okay, that's it," he said again, "let's skip ahead. Eric, Eric, Eric…where do I come into the picture? Oh, woe is me, my mom's getting remarried, and I have to move. I've heard this before. Now, where is Eric?" He once again flipped the pages and found the second chapter.

If all else failed, he could probably call Casey-if she even knew about it. In a very non-Casey move, she had missed Christmas that year and had stayed in New York over the winter holidays. He wasn't sure how things were at Columbia, but at U of T everyone went home for the holidays. Of course only Casey would be so involved with her schoolwork that she missed visits home and hung around the city for months on end during both the summer and winter months. It wasn't that he cared or anything, but one could only listen to Nora's complaints about Casey's absence so many times.

"Aha," he finally found his first scene deep within the second chapter and found that it wasn't much unlike his first meeting with Casey, Nora, and Lizzie, not like the completely opposite scene from the movie. He skipped ahead again and found himself reliving the first few months of their two families merging together and of her attending Thompson. The whole room thing, her time as Klutzilla and her grade grubbing tendencies, they were all there, nothing was skimmed over like it had been in the movie, but then again what movie was like the book? He couldn't be for sure when answering the question, not having read as many books as most other people, but he was pretty sure that none were quite as different from the original as this one.

Dialing a familiar number, Derek let the phone ring as he waited for his brother to answer. When Edwin finally answered the phone, Derek bombarded him with questions, the main one being, "What's the deal with this book thing? The movie too."

"I don't-"

"And before you say that you don't know," Derek said, cutting him off effectively before he could say those exact words, "I know you know. Emily knew, and everyone knows that for the most part, she can't keep her mouth shut. And if she knew, then her mom probably knew, which means that Dad and Nora probably know too, so spill."

"Did you ever think that we might be so busy getting ready for graduation that things like that might just fly under the radar?" Edwin suggested in a bored tone.

Derek did admit that it was a possibility that it could probably fly under their parents radar, but definitely not Edwin or Lizzie's, busy with graduation plans and end of the school year things or not.

"Okay, so I might have heard about the movie and I might have seen it, but I don't know who wrote the book. Isn't her name Stephanie or something like that? I don't think I know anyone named Stephanie."

Derek flipped to the front cover, unable to remember the name of the author. "Stephanie Bennet. Yeah, I don't recognize the name either, but that doesn't really mean anything does it? I mean, did anyone interview you or anything?"

"Derek," Edwin sighed, and Derek could swear that he heard Lizzie trying to fight back laughter in the background, "look, you're just being crazy about all of this, okay? It's a book. It isn't even that close to our lives, especially yours, so unless all of that stuff with you and Casey happened, then you have nothing to worry about. It isn't like whoever wrote it used our names anyway, so just don't worry about it and don't call back until at least two days after graduation. Oh, and while you're here for that, don't talk about it then either."

"But-" the phone emitted a couple of quick tones before going completely silent, signaling that his brother had hung up on him, and cutting him off before he was able to say anything else. He closed his phone and glared at it, fixing a glare to the phone much like the one he would be giving Edwin if the younger boy had been in front of him right then. "Oh, he knows something."

He debated calling Nora, but knew that she probably wouldn't be the best person to call.. Especially if she had no clue about the book or the movie to begin with because a movie where he and Casey made out and more definitely was not the movie that he would want his dad and Nora to watch on their next night out. That would be beyond awkward when it came time for him to go back home for the summer. So instead of calling Nora, he called Edwin's partner in crime-if you could call her that-Lizzie. If there was anyone who knew, but wasn't Edwin, then it had to be the younger McDonald…right?

Wrong. When he had called, he had the feeling that she was being coached. There were lots of pauses, and at times, he could almost swear that he was talking to his brother again when her words were exact parallels of the ones that Edwin had uttered only moments earlier. He asked her for Casey's new number-the older girl had bought a new cell phone since she now lived in New York to avoid roaming and other issues-and Lizzie had, for some reason, been hesitant to pass it along to Derek. The way she had reacted when he asked for it you would think that he and Casey still behaved like they had when they were fifteen. They didn't, they were civil to one another when they were both at the house for the holidays, at least he liked to think so, but he knew that he still wasn't his stepsister's most favorite person in the world. They talked-when they had to, they saw each other-when unavoidable. So when he thought about it a second time, maybe Lizzie's reaction wasn't unwarranted.

He set the book aside for a moment, punching the number that Lizzie had given him into his phone, as he made his way to a cabinet and pulled out a bag of Doritos and a bottle of pop.

The phone rang. It rang one, two, three, four times before finally going through to voicemail. He left a brief message, letting Casey know that it was him and to call him back, and deposited his phone and snacks onto his couch before he went back to his room to grab the book.

He was halfway through chapter two when the phone rang. It was Ralph.

"Hey, D, wanna grab a pizza with me and Sam later? Maybe have a boys night or something?"

"A boys night?" Derek asked skeptically. The last time they had had a 'boys night' Ralph had ended up playing skeeball until almost midnight at a carnival or something of the sort. The boys night before that, Sam ended up running into and ex-girlfriend and the two had decided to catch up, leaving Derek and Ralph to go to an arcade where Ralph racked up tickets playing skeeball and then decided to go outside where there was a miniputt course set up.

"Sam's not going to be busy with Olivia?" he mentioned the ex-girlfriend from two boys nights prior, who was now no longer an ex-girlfriend, but had decided to take back the third member of the band formerly known as D-Rock.

"Olivia's out of town. Visiting her parents back in the States. One of the directional ones or whatever. North Carolina, North Dakota, South Carolina…maybe West Virginia. I can't remember, but she's gone for two weeks. Sam's moping. Sam moping is not cool, he's bringing me down by being down. So I figure we need a boys night, you know, to get rid of the whole uncool, mopey, whipped angle that Sam's got going on."

"What, no date with Ellie tonight?" he brought up the pretty girl that Ralph had met at the split-music and bookstore that he worked at shortly after moving to Toronto. They had been dating since. They had a lot in common, and even though Derek still wasn't much in the commitment department, he knew that Ralph was, and the girl was perfect for his friend.

"Dude, that isn't cool," Ralph bemoaned. "You know that sweet drums and I are having a break right now."

"A break, riiight," Derek drawled. "Not that I blame her, I thought I told you to stop calling her 'sweet drums' when you first came up with that nickname?"

"She likes the nickname! And she needed the break because her cat died."

"A cat that you've never seen in your life," Derek interjected.

"Because it's, like, dead. Don't you know what that word means?"

"Yeah, it means your relationship because you call the chick some gay-ass nickname like 'sweet drums'. Remember when Sam came up with that nickname for Olivia? Olive?"

"That's an actual nickname for Olivia, though, dude," Ralph tried to point out to his friend.

"Oh, no, I know, but then Sam went on to tell her that story about his aunt Olive. Kind of scared her off. That was around the time they broke up that one time, wasn't it?"

"That doesn't meant anything," his friend protested. "First of all, that doesn't mean it's the reason why Olivia and Sam broke up in the first place, and then, even if it was…that story about Sam's aunt Olive's missing toe is creepy. I'm sure Olivia didn't want to be compared to a toeless old lady who just sits around and watches _As the World Turns _all day. My nickname for Ellie's endearing," Ralph said defensively. "At least I think that's what she called it."

"More like pathetic. You let her kick you around like a dead dog."

"Ellie doesn't kick dogs, not even dead ones, she's a good person that way. It'd probably remind her of Cat Tripper too much."

"Cat…Tripper?" Derek asked confused as to what exactly his friend was talking about.

"Yeah, dude," Ralph sighed before continuing slowly as if it were the most obvious answer in the world, "Ellie's cat. His name was Cat Tripper. You know, after Jack Tripper…from _Three's Company_? I told you, that cat's dead. So it wouldn't be really nice to go around just kicking dead animals all random and stuff."

"Ralph…" Derek had no words when it came to responding to his friend's statement. "I'm kind of busy right now."

"Oh, right, so you have been reading Casey's book? I wasn't sure if you would or not. What do you think? I didn't read it, but Sam did," he left the last sentence hanging as if it explained all.

Derek sighed, confused by all that Ralph was saying at once, it all was just really swimming around in his head, before something he had said registered in his mind. "Wait, Casey's book?"

"Um," Ralph paused hesitantly before continuing. "Yeah, the book about you and Casey…it's your guys' book, right?"

"That's not what you said," Derek replied, drawing every other word out slowly in that way of his, the way that he constantly used when he wanted someone to admit that he was right and they were wrong, even if he was only right every six out of ten times or something in that general percentile.

"Yeah it is. I asked you if you were reading the book about you and Casey, I didn't say anything about Casey writing it. Wait…" There was another significant pause and a distinct sound of shuffling before Ralph continued, more than likely digging himself a deeper hole than the first. "Never mind," he sighed. "I don't remember what I was going to say."

"So," Derek had to clear his throat after this because the one word came out garbled. "So," he tried again, "you're saying that Casey wrote the book."

"Yes," Ralph said quietly. There was the sound of the refrigerator opening and closing, followed by the sound of a bag rattling. He was probably getting fruit. A banana, maybe an orange, Ralph ate fruit when nervous. It was probably the only time the man ate anything nutritious.

"So she isn't so busy with her fancy intellectual university in New York to come home during the summer and stuff like she said? She hasn't been taking courses during the summer?" Derek asked frantically. If those two weren't true, then had she really been staying in the city working on this, this book that he had been reading? The one that had spawned a crazy movie starring Zac Efron, as him no less, and tons of fan girls? Not that he didn't get the whole fan girl-reaction already, he was kind of used to that, but since when could Casey keep a lie up for so long?

"I don't think so," Ralph mumbled around whatever substance was in his mouth, "she wasn't busy when Sam, Em, and I went to visit her. Why didn't you tell me her dad was loaded? Dude totally lives in one of those really nice neighborhoods in the city. You know, the ones that all those TV shows and movies are set in? I thought I was going to see, like, Blake Lively or chick from _The Grinch _or something. I didn't, but I think I did see Regis Philbin, which I guess was kinda cool."

"Ralph…" The fact that his friend thought he saw the host of some of the dumbest talk shows, reality shows, and game shows was the least of his worries. A new thought had just come to Derek's consciousness and it was something much more important than a creepy guy who referred to himself in third person. "You know what this means, right?"

"What what means?" he asked, his voice once again muffled by the food that he was busy chewing.

"See, before, I thought that someone else wrote this book. Like Sheldon, or you know, someone who knew me and Case. I kind of thought it might have been her at first, but then I thought, 'Nah, poetry's more her thing.' And you know, she was busy as hell with school, 'cause, she was staying there during the summer and stuff and taking extra classes. But what if she was avoiding me?" Derek theorized all at once, popping a chip into his mouth after he was finished sharing his theory.

"Like, because of the movie? Why would she be avoiding you?" Ralph was confused, sure, Derek was smart and at times seemed to have all of the answers, but why would Casey stay in New York just to stay away from Derek? That was stupid, especially since they had that kind of understanding thing that they had come to during their last year of high school. "It was all basically your dudes' lives. Except for, you know, the heavy make out sessions and stuff. Unless you have something that you need to tell all of us, D?"

"No, I don't, that's just it. What if she was writing about what she wanted to happen all along, though?"

"Like, she's in love with you or something? And she couldn't tell you, so she wrote the book-a book that she probably didn't think you would ever read or know about?" Ralph asked incredulously.

"Okay, well, when you say it that way…" It sounded stupid, he knew, but it was Casey they were talking about-was it not? Since when did Casey make _any _sense? Besides, it wasn't as If it were completely unlikely. He was good looking, he knew it, girls fell over him all the time, why not Casey? And of course she wouldn't want him to know that she had. His only question was why Emily couldn't have told him everything to begin with. It sure would have saved him a hell of a lot of trouble if she had.

The next morning, after a boys' night that consisted of Sam wanting to watch all of Olivia's favorite movies and make long-distance calls to the States to talk to the blonde, found Derek boarding a plane. It had been Ralph's idea, and a pretty good one, albeit inspired by the chick flicks that he wasn't even sure why they were enduring, but he was going to go talk to Casey himself. Sam and Ralph had tried periodically to call her throughout the night, but Derek's guess was that she knew what was up and that her cover was blown because they both only reached her voicemail, just like Derek had earlier that day.

The flight didn't take long compared to the few flights he had experienced in his life, and after having to flash his passport and go through all of the different security measures at the airport after touching down in the Big Apple, he was finally able to go off on his own and track down a taxi. The driver, a man whose name Derek couldn't hope to ever be able to pronounce, took him to the Upper West Side and to the apartment building that he knew Dennis McDonald lived in. He wasn't exactly sure if Casey would be living in the same dorm that she had during her first year, and to be completely honest, he didn't even know what dorm that was, so his best bet at finding his stepsister would be to go through the father.

The look that the older man gave him when he met him at the door told Derek that he knew exactly why he was there-did everyone but him know about Casey's book turned movie? It was beginning to seem that way, he knew that Sam and Ralph both knew, Emily too, and quite possibly Sheldon. He was also sure that Lizzie and Edwin knew. They could deny it, but he knew that they-at the very least-knew something. Not just that a book had been written and turned into a movie, but something about the actual author.

After talking to Dennis, he managed to talk an address out of him and less than a half hour later, found himself ringing up to an apartment that was next to both a Starbucks and a McDonalds.

"Hello person who I do not know," the sandy haired blonde remarked upon opening the door for Derek after he climbed the two flights to the apartment number on the small slip of paper.

"Is Casey here?"

"Are any of us really here?" she quipped before laughing. "Sorry, I couldn't resist. I was channeling my stoner brother there for a sec. Yeah. Let me go get her, I'm Steph by the way."

"Is that short for anything?" Derek asked, but the girl was already walking back into the apartment. He stayed by the door, he felt intrusive otherwise, not that he usually cared.

Steph stopped by the couch, maneuvering her way around it before turning back to Derek. "Yeah, Stephanie. Although that lengthens to Stephanie Anne when my mom's pissed. That's probably why I prefer just Steph."

She disappeared around a corner and Derek heard Casey clearly protesting when Stephanie told her that she had a visitor. A male visitor, no less, and one who actually wasn't bad looking and didn't smell as if he hadn't showered in days or talked like he wanted to be the next Shakespeare-that one kind of scared Derek.

Peeking around the corner, Stephanie cast an apologetic look at Derek and motioned toward the couch. "You can sit. It'll just be a second."

"Stephie," Derek heard, "you can't make me go out there. Not only did I ignore calls for just this reason, but I specifically told my dad when he called a little while ago that he was not to give my address to anyone. I mean, it's bad enough for my publicist to ask me about the 'ardor' between my stepbrother and I when she knows exactly-" the door closed and the tones were more hushed, which caused him to take Steph up on her offer of the couch. Perhaps he could catch strains of the conversation from there.

The door opened and Derek strained to see Stephanie pushing Casey down the hallway and, finally, into the living room. "I told you, Case, I have to go to work now, so I can't entertain our guest, which means you do. And aren't you the one always telling me what is right and wrong when it comes to hosting? You have a freakin' list about it, girl, you're crazy! So follow your list and let me go to work because not all of us have hit movies based on books that we wrote and money out the butt. Which is why I have to go next door and ask people, 'Do you want fries with that?' to be able to fork over my half of the rent."

She said her goodbyes and left the apartment, leaving Casey to stand by the archway that led to the living room and Derek sitting awkwardly on their couch.

Casey walked the length of the room to another archway and paused before turning to look at Derek. "Do you want something to drink? Or maybe something to eat?" she offered, which caused Derek to raise an eyebrow questioningly. "It's polite to offer guests refreshments. Even if they aren't really considered guests and are, in fact, your asshole of a stepbrother who you had to live three years with in the same house." She smiled.

"Uh, no? That's okay, I guess."

She nodded, but grabbed a water bottle for herself from the refrigerator before perching herself on the loveseat that was to the left of the couch making a ninety degree angle. "So, there're two possibilities. Em either took you to see the movie or some girlfriend of yours did. Sucked, didn't it?"

"Emily dragged me," Derek agreed, but stopped himself from clarifying. "Wait-what?"

"It sucked," Casey shrugged. "I should have known it would."

"Oh, yeah, it was…something. So Steph," he tried to make small talk. He'd had to let down girls before, but never family. That'd be kind of weird, but he didn't want things to be awkward on the holidays, even if it was just Casey and she never bought him anything that cost more than a pair of socks.

"What about her? Wait, do you like her because there is no way I am going to set the two of you up. You've dated enough of my friends."

"One could say the same about you," Derek retorted.

"I dated two of your friends, thank you very much. And I only dated Sam for a little over a month. You only have two friends, anyway. How could I date any more than that?"

Derek scowled. "I had more than two friends in high school. And I wasn't asking that about Stephanie. I was just guessing that you used her name for your book. You know, the whole not using your real name thing?"

"Yes, I used her name. Her first name, at least," Casey sighed. "She told me that I could because she knew that I didn't want to use my own, but now that I think about it, that was kind of weird because you and the people who would obviously be offended by reading it would not read it in the first place. Of course, that must not be true since you're here. Or maybe you only saw the movie? You said Em dragged you to see it, right?"

He shrugged, "Yeah, but I got the book too. I had to drag Ralph with me to get _that_."

"Okay, good, so you read it." Casey laughed, "I was afraid that you hadn't read it and you just came here because of all of the stuff in the movie. Seriously, they're comparing it to _Clueless_ and _Cruel Intentions_. And I like those movies, don't get me wrong, but since when is it anything like that? I guess it's the whole weird-stepsibling angle, but…" She trailed off and pursed her lips together, looking at Derek questioningly. "Wait," she began again, "if you read the book, then why are you here? You did just fly all the way from Canada to New York, right? I'm pretty sure it wasn't just to see your least favorite stepsister."

"Hold on," Derek spoke up, while using his hands to talk at the same time. "I'm confused. How different was your book from the movie?"

"…so you didn't read it?" Casey asked.

"No, I did," he insisted. "Er, I mean, I read a couple-three, four, chapters."

"Oh my gosh! You did get the whole unrequited love impression from the movie, didn't you? You came here to let me down easy or something," she continued laughing and he made a face.

"No, that isn't it at all! Well…maybe. Kind of, but what do you expect? Like, half of the movie was some chick who was supposed to be you and Zac Efron, who was supposed to be me, making out. And it was based on your book, so I read…most of it," he paused here and inserted a grimace-he'd not even read a fourth of it. The book was just too damn long. "How was I supposed to know that your book was that different? Or, you know, however different it was…I didn't finish. So, you know, it'd be really nice if you told me about any crushes or anything that you have on me or urges to jump me that may be in the book that I don't know about." He paused again, waiting for a reply-or at the very least laughter-but was met by silence.

"You do know that teen fiction books generally have larger print, right? I mean, four hundred pages in it would be, like, two-fifty or something in a normal print book. I'd think even you would be able to read that, Der," Casey jibed after she finally collected her thoughts.

"Yeah, well, I've already had to listen to your bullshit angst fest one time in my life, Case, forgive me if I didn't jump right in and immediately read four hundred pages worth when I had the chance."

"Well, excuse me while I laugh my ass off at the fact that you thought I was in love with you," Casey smirked.

"Oh please," Derek scoffed. "I would be surprised if you weren't. After all," he continued with raised eyebrows, "you used to see more of me than most girls could ever wish to see."

"What? You scratching places that I wish I never knew you had with a fork? Yeah, that's real attractive, Derek. I need you, I want you, I can't hold back this burning passion that I have for you any longer," Casey responded monotonously. "Sorry to burst your bubble, but you aren't my type. And the fact that I lived with you for three years definitely doesn't aid your argument that you're some great catch. Thanks for telling me, though. I'll keep that in mind the next time I feel the need to publish a book and get a movie made based off of our lives that's all about our undying love. Maybe it could be the turning point for us."

She rolled her eyes, crossing her arms. "But seriously, Derek…why did you come here? Just to let me down easy because I was so in love with you? But when you found out that I wasn't…you get offended and try to point out all of your redeeming, good-boyfriend qualities? Did Ralph and Sam get you drunk last night? I know Sam said Olivia was out of town...and Ralph said something about getting dumped."

"He didn't get dumped," Derek said with the same defensive tone that Ralph had used the day before with him, "her cat died. She needed time to mourn."

"Wasn't this cat dead when he met the girl?"

He shrugged. "That's what I thought. Anyway, are you going to Liz and Ed's graduation?"

"What?" Casey asked, caught off guard by the question.

"I asked if you were going to their graduation...you were out of town for Christmas, and you're not going to be home for the summer is year, or so Nora tells me. You really need to talk to your mom once in awhile. Do you know how awful it is when she rants to me about you? Or at least tell her that if she needs someone to rant to that she should choose someone in the same house. You know, like Ed. Or Lizzie. Not Smarti, she's just a baby, I don't know if she can hold up against the rants that you and your mom throw at people. You need, like, special armor for those."

"Like no one needs armor to protect themselves against your stench."

Derek smirked and ran a hand along his shoulder as if brushing off invisible dirt. "Hey, you're not the only person with copyrighted material. Odor a la Derek will be coming out this fall."

"I hope you didn't put up much money when you made that," Casey commented. "Otherwise, you might go bankrupt."

He raised his eyebrows as if questioning her comment, but said nothing of it. "So, you'll talk to your mom and you'll come to the graduation?" She nodded in response and he continued, "And you're sure I don't have to worry about you being madly in love with me and maybe attacking me in my sleep while we're staying in London?"

She glared, "Der-ek. I told you…"

"Relax, can't I just have a little fun with the situation?" he asked innocently, grinning. "After all, I was afraid I'd never be able to go see Marti or my dad again. You know, if you ever decided to visit your mom."

……

**Note for flashfic people: If you want to participate in the June round of flashfic, make sure that you PM or email me your prompts by three o'clock EST this afternoon. I want to match everyone else before I go to work today. ****:)**


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